


In Which a Hunting Trip Becomes More

by Untherius



Category: Emberverse - S. M. Stirling, Howl Series - Diana Wynne Jones, Tangled (2010)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-17
Updated: 2012-12-17
Packaged: 2017-11-21 08:21:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,944
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/595570
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Untherius/pseuds/Untherius
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>While on an otherwise routine hunting trip, Morgan encounters more than he'd expected.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Wind River

**Author's Note:**

  * For [abluestocking](https://archiveofourown.org/users/abluestocking/gifts).



Wind River Range, Wyoming  
June 17, CY 6, 2018 AD

Morgan Ashowl Rependragon peered at a set of tracks he'd been following. They'd been made by something with cloven hooves. Based on where he was, that animal had probably been a mule deer. He glanced up at the limber pines towering above him. Of the two other animals that made such tracks, elk would have been larger, and pronghorn generally kept to the sagebrush and juniper steppes of the lowlands.

He'd been told that a great deal of that land had once been farmed. Most of the farmland between the Rocky Mountain front and the Mississippi River had been reclaimed by sagebrush, rabbit brush, and grasses in the six years since Earth had Shifted. Herds of pronghorn, elk, and bison had returned, as had runs of the shovelnose sturgeon that he'd been told had once nearly vanished from Wyoming's rivers.

His route had taken him over the northwestern end of the Wind River Range and then along that range's northeast-facing yellow pine belt to his current position on the northeastern flank of Limestone Mountain. To the north lay the Shoshone Indian lands. Morgan was to travel eastward along the watershed's crest across the Beaver Divide and Crooks Mountain to Green Mountain. Thence he'd travel southwestward along the western edge of Rawlins' territory--which had been expanding every year—through Chain Lakes Flat at the northern edge of the Great Divide Basin, west to Jack Morrow Creek and Eden Valley, then follow the Sandy River downstream to Green River, which he was to follow upstream and back to his home near that river's headwaters northwest of Pinedale.

He was to gather both game and information during what was expected to take a couple of months. Already he'd bagged two bighorn sheep, four deer, two elk, and a grizzly.

He peered more closely at the tracks. A few drops of something dark stood out against the lighter buff of the soil. He risked taking his right hand from his bow string and the arrow nocked against it. Everyone in the Perry Band carried and was proficient with a horn bow made from the Rocky Mountain bighorn sheep that lived in the region. One couldn't be too careful. Fortunately, as the son of the world's most powerful mage and the most powerful empath, conventional weapons were not the only ones in his arsenal.

He knelt down, took a pinch of the dark substance and put it into his mouth. Through the grit of limestone trail dust, the unmistakable taste of blood filled his mouth. Morgan smiled. After days of boredom, things were finally becoming interesting.

Morgan's father and his Uncle Gareth were expecting some company. Apparently, that company ate a lot, so everyone had stepped up hunting and gathering operations. Hence Morgan's hunting trip. Though he was only thirteen, Morgan could have passed for a sixteen-year-old. He wasn't entirely sure why. Some people naturally matured sooner than others, certainly. In his case, though, he strongly suspected it had a lot to do with his mother's frequent remarks about how she wished he would grow up. He knew she possessed that kind of power, he just never knew how far it could go. Or maybe she'd written it into his DNA when he'd been in her womb. Nobody knew and his mother wasn't telling.

He'd been out for nearly two weeks now. So far, he'd found that things weren't much different from the way they were at what passed for home. He still hunted and fished and foraged and gathered fuel for fires. He still had to do it in any and all weather. He still had to make arrows and maintain his bow and his armor. It was still warm during the day and below freezing at night.

Except that he had to do everything himself: shelter; fires; cooking; laundry; and so on. He could probably stay away indefinitely, except that it was awfully lonely. He was pretty sure the solitude would get to him after a while, though he'd never admit it to anyone. Still, being alone all day and night every day and night was a lot different from going outside the camp for a couple of hours for “me time” or spending all morning by himself catching fish in the river or over at the lake.

Now he had something new to occupy his mind. It was inconclusive, strictly speaking, what had been wounded, how, and by what. It was likely the same deer which had left the tracks had also shed the blood. He didn't have enough evidence yet to determine much else. He did, however, know that in order for any noticeable amount of blood to fall from the animal, it had to be bleeding fairly rapidly. Otherwise, the blood would have dried and the wound clotted. That implied a serious wound. That, in turn, meant easy prey. That, however, also made it easy prey for coyotes, wolves, and cougars.

Morgan returned his hand to his bow string and slightly tightened his grip on the stave. He needed to be ready to draw and loose at a moment's notice. That was always a good idea anyway. Banditry was a persistent problem throughout the region, had been since the Shift, and probably would remain so for many years to come.

He followed the trail for a while. He remained alert, listening, sniffing, looking over his shoulder now and then. Even after the sun had reached its zenith and had begun its downward slide, he'd seen no further signs of any other living things, save for the hoofprints and the occasional drop of blood. Still, he had the unshakable feeling he was being watched and stalked. Even the birds and squirrels were silent and still and that didn't bode well. Frankly, he'd have been surprised if he were the only one following that deer. The question was, who or what was out there?

He was capable of sensing the presence of sentient beings a little over a mile away. If they were close enough, he could, even in pitch-darkness, pinpoint their location to less than half a meter. For that reason, a few people in the band had suggested that Morgan pursue what they called black-ops assassin work. But his father had violently opposed the idea. He'd been, and continued to be, quite adamant that Morgan never take sentient life.

Howl had himself killed some people and everyone said it had affected him deeply. Morgan didn't understand, but several others had echoed Howl's objections, every one of them having once taken sentient life themselves, so Morgan had to confess that they knew that of which they spoke. Part of him wanted to heed their warning, but part of him—the part everyone said he'd inherited from his father—wanted to push the envelope. The upshot of that was that there were no humans or Ingarians anywhere within at least a mile of him and it would be virtually impossible for anyone to sneak up on him. That, in turn, meant that whatever was out there close enough to harm him was an animal.

Coyotes had a well-deserved place in Native American lore as tricksters. They were bold, curious, and sometimes raided food supplies. Their diet consisted almost entirely of scavenging, and small animals such as squirrels and rabbits. But they very rarely attacked people.

Wolves were more aggressive. They typically traveled in packs, and consistently took down larger animals like deer, elk, and the occasional moose. That made them a lot more dangerous than coyotes. Fortunately, they were highly unlikely to attack people during the summer. That risk was generally relegated to the winter months when people hardly ever strayed from camp anyway and wolves tended to keep their distance unless very, very hungry.

Cougars, on the other hand, were another matter entirely. They were reclusive. They were aggressive predators known to take down just about anything with a pulse. Above all, they were highly unpredictable and that made them dangerous. Morgan had it on good authority that a cougar could be following you and you'd never know it until it was too late. Fortunately, he had a few tricks up his sleeve.

To be on the safe side, Morgan re-wove the muffling spell that kept his leather armor from creaking. Some spells were subject to entropy and had to be periodically re-done. It was all a part of maintenance. He still loved magic. He could have been wearing full steel plate with no padding whatsoever, every piece could have been hitting every other piece, and he could still have made the whole suit silent as the grave, even at a dead sprint.

The sun sank lower and lower and still he pursued his quarry. The game trail he'd been following dove off into an eastern branch of Snow Creek. Lush vegetation, mostly alders and wild plums from the look of it, hid whatever lay at the bottom. He could hear water. That was good, for he'd drained the last of his own that morning. It might be a good place to spend the night, except for a few things. First, cold, damp air always settled in low places. Second, the white noise would mask the sounds of approaching threats. Third, the heavy vegetation would all but obliterate his visibility, except where the two branches of the creek converged at an open meadow. He knew from experience, though, that sleeping in a meadow was a guaranteed way to wake up cold, dew-soaked, and shivering and even Morgan's father didn't know any spells to help with that.

The best option would be to hydrate down there, rest up a bit, then find a spot on some southeast-facing slope. Choosing a campsite was at least as much art as science. Worst-case scenario, he could pick up the deer's trail again in the morning. The animal would go as far as it would go and Morgan wasn't a Dark-seer anyway. He still had a couple of hours before he had to make a decision about that.

He suddenly realized he'd lost the trail. The worn path was still clear enough, but there were no longer any tracks or blood drops. That would teach him to let his mind wander. He retraced his steps and found the track again some fifty meters back. He bent down, searching the verge for more signs. The animal had clearly left the trail somewhere nearby. The game was afoot!

Morgan thought about using magic to help. The trouble was that doing so brought high risk of contaminating the evidence. No, he'd have to do it the hard way.

He poked at a bit of blood on the trail, hoping to gain some idea of how long ago it might have been shed. The results were inconclusive. A bit of scat would have been nice right about now. That was usually a much better gauge of how recently an animal had passed by a particular spot.

Morgan swept his gaze back and forth methodically. A blood drop or a hoofprint or a displaced bit of vegetation could be anywhere. Finally, he saw it. About waist-height, several manzanita leaves bore blood smears. He'd almost missed it. Manzanita were sometimes prone to wasp gall, which was expressed as red blisters on the leaves. It also didn't help that the twigs and branches of manzanita were covered with smooth, red bark. Nor did it help that manzanita bore pink flowers and red berries.

Morgan rubbed a finger on a bloody leaf. It was still wet. He wasn't sure how good of a sign that was. It meant his quarry was close, but he still had that nagging feeling that he was being watched.

He paused and took sensory inventory. The forest was still strangely silent. Even the wind was still. Had he still lived in what his elders called “civilization,” he might have found the stillness to be unnerving, eerie even. However, more than half of Morgan's life had been essentially nomadic and he could probably count on two hands the number of months he'd spent living under any sort of permanent roof and even those times had been siege situations. In fact, his father and several of the others in the band had had to shoot their way out. The upshot was that Morgan had grown used to variations in his environment, from raging storms that threatened to blow him and his clear across the Great Plains, to the sort of utter, near-sensory-deprivational silence found only in pictures and in evenings like that one.

Morgan followed the trail toward the toe of a rock outcrop where he stopped. He resisted the urge to press his nose to it. He should remain upright. That would give him a better view of the whole rock surface, and therefore a better chance of quickly seeing the next drop of blood. It would also keep him in a more effective combat-readiness stance.

He spotted another drop of blood and crept up onto the rock, being careful to step softly. Soundless footfalls were just as tricky on solid rock as they were on the debris-covered forest floor, just in different ways. Fortunately, he usually went barefooted. The long, equally-sized toes of his bi-symmetrical feet splayed out and gripped the rough surface.

Cresting the rock, Morgan's gaze fell upon a small clearing surrounded by aspens. He heard a trickle of water somewhere off to his right. A stag lay in the clearing, its side heaving heavily. It was clearly dying. He stepped carefully from boulder to boulder, then down to the clearing. The stag tried to get up, but its legs buckled under it and it collapsed again. It had a large gash in its side. There were four of them, actually, and they were bleeding heavily. That was consistent with a cougar attack.

Morgan stepped toward the animal. Again, it tried to flee and again, it collapsed, reopening its wounds yet again. Morgan moved his right hand from the bow string, made a sort of swirling gesture in the air, and then shoved magic toward the stag. Its head twitched violently, with a sort of muffled snapping sound, and then the whole animal went still.

Morgan lay his bow on the ground, drew his knife, and knelt down next to the stag's head. He bent his head close to it. He could smell the animal's sweat and the unmistakable odor of death. It was something people didn't used to know much, let alone understand. Over the previous six years, however, more and more people had come to be intimately acquainted with death. One never really got over it, no matter how often one experienced it or how much one seemed to get used to it.

He quickly drew the blue-ish blade, a ten-inch Bowie-type forged of pure ingarium, across the animal's throat. The blood had just begun to gush when Morgan plastered his mouth over the wound he'd just made. He drank in the deliciousness, savoring the coppery, iron tang of the thick liquid as it ran into his mouth and trickled down his throat. Drinking the blood of a kill was something his parents had taught him to do. They, along with his Aunt Lettie, Uncle Osric, cousin Neil, and cousin Nalaya, had done it in the Sierra Nevada and Cascade Mountains of California and Oregon the summer before the Shift.

The blood-sucking ritual had not been widely adopted, however. The lothnellir did it, of course, but then again, they had a lot of unusual ways. All Ingarians had adopted the practice, as had Morgan's Aunt Megan, Uncle Gareth, and cousin Mari. None of the other humans had so far been able to stomach drinking blood. No one really minded much, though, as the risk to humans of blood-borne pathogens was high. Fortunately, the band's medical staff was the best in the world.

Morgan finished draining the animal as much as he could, taking a few strong sucks on its neck. There wasn't much left, which didn't surprise him. The stag had apparently already lost a lot of blood, even before he'd picked up its trail.

Morgan sat back almost onto his heels. Like all Ingarians, he had to be careful about that. The humans seemed to think that he and other Ingarians were likely to impale themselves on their own dewclaws. Never mind that it was anatomically impossible. He did, however, have to be careful not to snag them on all the detritus and vegetation. Sometimes he wished his mother would have arranged for his human half to be more apparent on the outside.

Morgan took a deep breath and held it, savoring the lingering taste in his mouth. He licked his lips, searching for the inevitable dribbles of the sweet, sticky fluid. He did so love the flavor of blood. There was also something about it that literally carried some of an animal's life energy. Most people thought that was symbolic, but Morgan knew otherwise. He could feel it.

He cleaned his blade—magically, of course--and resheathed it. He was about to get up, when a slight movement caught his eye. He froze. Turning his head slowly, he found himself nearly eye-to-eye with the largest cougar he'd ever seen. That would certainly explain why he'd felt like he was being stalked all day.

The cat crouched on a rock and stared at Morgan. He glanced at his bow where he'd lain it. It was a good three paces away. If that cat decided to pounce...

No sooner had Morgan formed the thought, than the cougar lunged toward him, a tawny blur of fur, teeth, and claws that blended with an aggressive yowl. Morgan barely had time to turn his face away and shift his already-raised left elbow.

Morgan rolled slightly, his left elbow coming up a bit more. He felt a tremendous jolt of pressure as two hundred pounds of cat hit him.

Its attack yowl turned into a grating scream of pain, which quickly drowned in a sort of gurgling growl. Morgan felt something wet splattering on the side of his face and gushing onto his elbow. Claws scrabbled frantically against his deer-hide torso armor. His arm bucked violently back and forth and side to side, his hand ramming repeatedly into the ground, his own body, and the deer next to him. A sharp pain exploded in his tricep...once...twice...thrice...then twice on his forearm...and on his earlobe. Sharp vibrations and the sound of something hard and sharp against leather competed with the cougar's gurgle in his ear and the violent jerking motions on his arm. After what felt like forever, but was probably only a few minutes, the cougar's struggling weakened and it finally went still, its weight still pulling on Morgan's arm.

Morgan stayed where he was, breathing heavily, until the adrenaline began to wear down. He rolled the cat a little, then slid his left lenom—what the humans called a bone spur and was really nothing of the sort—all thirteen inches of it, out of the cat's throat. He quickly spun around and plastered his mouth over the elliptical hole in the cat's throat and drank what little blood still welled up from it. He found that different animals' blood had different and distinct flavors.

Then he sat back and panted. He looked up at the sky, the sun's light transitioning from late afternoon into evening. Then he looked back at the cougar. There was red froth around its mouth where blood had mixed with saliva. Morgan was sure the wet splatter on his own face must have come from that. The fur around the hole in its throat was matted with blood. Otherwise, it was a magnificent animal.

Morgan took inventory of himself. His entire left arm ached, from his fingertips all the way up to his shoulder-blades. He had several nasty gashes in his triceps and a few on his forearm. The wounds bled profusely and hurt like nothing he could describe. He reached over with his right hand and magically staunched the bleeding. He'd address the wounds later. Maybe he'd have a few battle scars to show for it!

Then he tested all his joints. He'd jammed two fingers. He—or, rather, the cat—had wrenched his elbow quite badly. His shoulder was strained severely. Miraculously, he hadn't torn, dislocated, or broken anything during the cougar's struggle, nor had it severed his brachial artery. He was also surprised the cat hadn't ripped out its own throat while impaled on Morgan's elbow. That elbow was completely coated in cougar blood from tip to base and the skin to a couple of inches on either side of the joint.

He'd need to clean out his wounds and apply a poultice or risk infection. Morgan rose carefully to his feet, walked over to the small spring on the far side of the clearing and washed out the wounds. It stung something fierce. Then he returned, drew his knife, and used a magical blade extension spell to cut the skull cap off the cougar. He scooped out its brain, spoke some words to it, and rubbed it into the gash on his arm. He fought the urge to scream. Few things—not salt, not straight iodine, not a rattlesnake bite--hurt like a magically-prepared field poultice. He took a few ragged breaths and blinked tears from his eyes. The pain was not likely to subside any time soon, so he'd have to gather his thoughts and focus through it. At least it would start the deep-healing process and prevent infection.

Then he stepped over to where his bow lay and picked it up. He drew. He was barely at quarter draw when the pain in his arms made him wince. He relaxed the draw and lightly massaged both joints. That was going to make things problematic. The shredded muscles would repair overnight well enough, but that connective tissue was another story. Morgan was powerful, but he hadn't inherited his mother's healing abilities. He could, however, nudge things along, especially with the right ingredients. He got to work.

First, Morgan needed a bowl. He drew his knife and used a magical blade extension spell to cut the skull cap off the deer. He severed the antlers before filling the inverted skull from the spring. Returning to the carcases, he set a small log on a rock, then grasped the end of the log, and said, “Fugham!” Fire!

The whole log promptly burst into uniform flame. That particular spell could have easily set the whole forest on fire during dry and windy conditions. Fortunately, it was still late spring in the mountains and things had not yet dried out much. He set the bowl of water to boil while he gathered ingredients for a healing tea.

He climbed up to where a few junipers grew above the clearing. One of them still held a few of the previous season's old berries. Otherwise, it was still far too early, so he cut a few new sprigs. Then he went about collecting lupine, columbine, shooting-star, ceanothus, Douglas fir, larkspur, buttercup, iris, and death camas. While all of that was simmering, he went to work on the carcases.

Morgan first opened the deer. He spread the viscera out on the ground, retaining the heart, which he'd roast, and the liver, spleen, and kidneys, which he'd eat raw. He repeated the procedure with the cougar. Satisfied that both animals would now cool more quickly without their internal organs, he turned to his dinner.

Morgan skewered each heart on a stout piece of aspen, and jammed the butt end of each skewer into the ground with the hearts held over the fire log. He added a couple more small logs and spread the flame so that it flickered strongly beneath the hearts and waited until they began to steam. Using an antler, he pulled the bowl out of the fire to cool.

He took off his armor and inspected it. He wore back and breast plates and shoulder guards of boiled deer hide. Normally, deer hide wasn't that tough, even when boiled. But it was much lighter than bison hide and in the hands of a mage, could be enchanted to be more durable than steel. In fact, all magi in the band wore their own magically-enhanced deer-hide armor, while everyone else wore the heavier bison armor. He looked it over in the rapidly-failing light. Normal armor would have been shredded by the sort of frantic clawing the cougar had made and Morgan was surprised his arm hadn't been turned into ribbons as well. His armor, though, showed only superficial scratches, though there were a LOT of them! Morgan shuddered. Without that armor, he'd have been killed. He laid it carefully at the base of a pine and sat down to eat.

He started on the softest organs, the livers. Eating raw organ meat was something else he'd learned from his parents. Unsurprisingly, the practice hadn't caught on well. In fact, most people, both human and Ingarian, became ill, sometimes violently so, over it. To Morgan, though, it was no big deal. Everyone said he had a strong constitution. He'd always shrugged and kept eating. The livers were slimy, yet satisfying. The spleens were a bit chewier and the kidneys chewier than the spleens. All were slimy and full of blood--sweet, delicious blood. Morgan knew the livers and kidneys were filter organs and contained certain toxins. But he also knew that they were rich in all kinds of minerals and other things and that his half-Ingarian physiology could deal with it better than his human half. Maintaining proper nutrition, particularly when it came to vitamins, minerals, and trace elements, had been difficult ever since the Shift and the consumption of organ meat went a good way toward addressing that. Back in camp, everyone shared. Out on the range, however, it was all his!

After finishing off the savory organs and licking the blood from his fingers, Morgan went over to check on the hearts. He squeezed them to check for firmness. They were nice and done on the outside, but still probably not on the inside. While he could eat them raw, a heart was the best lean protein in any animal and was usually quite tough and fibrous, which was why it was always best to cook it. Furthermore, cooked meat was far more easily digested. Morgan moved the embers around with an antler and added another stout stick under the hearts. He held a hand over the rock. Satisfied that it was hot enough, he again drew his knife and cut the tongues out of both animals and laid them on the hot rock. They sizzled weakly. He'd been told that things had sizzled far better before the Shift and that it had something to do with the behavior of gases. That was more of an academic thing, though. He just knew that a tongue was good lean protein. He'd eat one in the morning and take the other with him, just as he'd eat one heart now and carry the other to eat later.

While he waited for the rest of his food to cook, Morgan again turned back to the animals. Either of them would have been far more than he himself could hope to eat. Each one would also have been far more than he could carry any significant distance. Fortunately, he could send them back to camp. Neil called it “FedEx.” Morgan didn't know what that was, but it always made several people chuckle.

Morgan first picked up the antlers and laid them on the body, then stuffed the viscera back into the cavity. He wanted to send all of that back, too. Every part of every animal was useful for something. He walked over to a downed aspen and stripped off a section of bark. He scraped a brief message on it to the effect that he was fine and would be sending more in the morning, and then laid it on the stag next to the antlers. Then he drew his knife and shaved a complicated symbol in the stag's neck fur. He tapped its center three times with the blade and said, “Fosilowi,” go. The deer vanished. Morgan knew it would almost instantly reappear at a specially-marked site back home. He'd send the cougar in the morning. Magic made certain aspects of hunting so much easier.

Morgan stepped back to the rock and poked at the tongues with a stick, then carefully turned them over. That would have been easier with a spatula. Some of the meat stuck to the rock and he'd probably just have to leave it there. He'd forgotten that rock wasn't a non-stick surface. Otherwise, he'd have used a lubrication spell. After a few more minutes, the tongues looked done. The hearts might need a bit longer, so Morgan put another couple of stout sticks onto the fire and sat down to eat a tongue.

He'd eaten deer tongue before, of course, but always at home. It was usually cut up, mixed with other meats, and sautéed with things like eggs, onions, and bitterroot. Sometimes it was cut up and put into an eternal stew. He didn't think he'd ever eaten it straight before. He found it to be kind of tough and fibrous, a lot like jerked meat. That was fine, for he liked chewing on jerky as he walked, so he'd certainly do that with the cougar tongue in the morning.

When he'd finished the deer tongue, he pulled up the stick with the deer heart, sat down, and began to eat it like a leg of mutton. It was also kind of fibrous, especially the connective tissue surrounding the valves. He could save those for later, too, and chew on them while walking.

As he ate, Morgan reflected on his distant childhood. There was so much of it he didn't remember. He did, however, recall once being a very picky eater. He'd recently come to understand that young children were inherently like that. Still, he always wondered how much of his own was because he was half human and half Ingarian. Since the Shift, however, he'd become an omnivore. He hadn't made the transition overnight, of course. Mainly, it had happened as a result of being hungry enough to eat whatever was there. After a while, he'd simply gotten over it. His Aunt Megan had more than once declared that to have been no mean feat, given who his parents were. Morgan himself now considered it all just part of the events that had shaped the man he was becoming.

After eating, he stretched with his back against the dead cougar's. It still had a little residual warmth, enough to make his night less uncomfortable than it might have been otherwise. The still-burning fire cast warmth from the other direction. Morgan's clothing, woven of bighorn sheep wool, also helped keep him warm at night, even when damp with rain or sweat. That was the beauty of wool. It stayed warm even when wet. It somehow comforted him to know he could make do without magic when necessary. He gradually fell asleep.


	2. Crooks Gap

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Morgan meets someone he did not expect. Does his reputation precede him?

Crooks Mountain, Wyoming  
June 21, CY 6, 2018 AD

Morgan made his way across the foothills south of Crooks Peak. As usual, he moved with an arrow to the string. His woolens blended nicely with the sagebrush. The dirt on his exposed skin also helped. He'd resisted the urge to wash it off, knowing it would help with camouflage. Though he could feel a person within a mile or so, he could still be spotted from further away by anyone with a spyglass.

The wounds on his arm had healed up nicely. He'd done his exercises as per the protocol developed by Aunt Megan, so he shouldn't have any muscular scar tissue. The scars on his skin, however, were certain to greatly alarm his mother...and impress the girls.

He'd sent home a half-dozen pronghorn, two more deer, and three rattlesnakes.

Morgan made for a lone juniper and reveled in its dappled shade. He dug into an interior pocket of the pouch he wore on his belt and took out a very small bundle. He unwrapped it and took out a large jewel. It was round, two inches in diameter, and a half-inch thick. It bore a curious blue-ish tinge. It was composed entirely of a crystalline form of ingarium silicate.

He held it between thumb and forefinger and raised it to his eye. He twisted it one way and then the other as he moved it closer to and further from his eye until he brought into focus the desired bit of distant landscape. Morgan wondered how people tolerated conventional magnification, whether spyglass or binocular. Granted, the far-seeing crystals had a bit of a learning curve, but one didn't have to be a mage in order to use them.

Though in the shade, he still held his other hand over the crystal to shield it from overhead sunlight. A glint off one of its many facets would be more than enough to betray his position to anyone who might be looking in his direction. There was an awful lot of open country between his current position and the forested slopes of Green Mountain. He could, of course, travel at night. Had it been August, that would have been sorely tempting.

He was particularly concerned about Crooks Gap Road below him. He was entering Rawlins territory. He'd been told that the place had supported a major prison before the Shift, that those prisoners had escaped afterward, and that one of them had established himself as a regional warlord. Morgan's band had originally managed to avoid them on their way into the region by traveling up the Green River. In the intervening years, however, they'd had multiple dealings with Rawlins, all of those encounters violent. It was widely rumored that Rawlins simply didn't have the manpower to deal decisively with the Perry Band...yet.

Morgan always figured it to be easier to avoid trouble if he could see it coming first, rather than have to get out of its way later. Hence his preoccupation with the road. Looking south, he could see a pair of travelers, a man and a woman, leading an odd-looking pack animal that looked half sheep and half camel. Otherwise, there didn't seem to be anything unusual about them.

He swung his gaze northward and saw a small column of soldiers, at least twenty, all on horseback, and all bearing the insignia of Rawlins. That did not bode well for the travelers. They'd be conscripted on the spot. He swung back to the couple. The woman was young...very young...and attractive...and barefooted. She'd probably be raped...gang raped and repeatedly, before being pressed into service in one of the warlord's brothels. No, no, that did not bode well at all. Morgan exhaled deeply. Sometimes he hated having a conscience.

Morgan returned the crystal to its place. He could reach the couple just in time to help defend them. It wasn't that he expected them to be unarmed. No one ever went anywhere without weaponry of some kind. They were, however, outnumbered ten to one and probably practically untrained. While Morgan would only make three to twenty, his knowledge of magic was an incredible force multiplier. In fact, it was the second-greatest force-multiplier in the world, right after the element of surprise, since explosives and gunpowder stopped working when Earth Shifted.

* * *

A couple of hours later, Morgan stood on a slight rise, looking down at Crooks Gap Road. Even without magnification, he could see that the couple had stopped at the confluence of Spring and Crooks Creeks. They were probably getting water and maybe eating something. That made them even more vulnerable. There wasn't really anywhere to go anyway. Morgan descended to a small wash and followed it eastward to where the couple sat on the north embankment, their animal grazing nearby.

“Oh, hello,” said the woman as Morgan approached.

Morgan didn't expect to be able to sneak up on them, though he certainly could have if he'd tried. He gathered his thoughts. He really hated speaking English. He'd have thought that, being half human, he'd have had a lot less difficulty with languages other than Ingarian. “Good...afternoon,” he said.

The couple stood up, both moving with the same sort of fluid grace Morgan had seen in animals like the cougar that had attacked him. He sensed a great deal of confidence and power behind them. Not many humans moved like that. Neither of them was a mage, though they both held something within them Morgan couldn't identify. The woman, however, possessed a mind-boggling amount of power. Whatever it was, it wasn't magical. Morgan suddenly had a feeling that the woman was extremely dangerous, even more dangerous than his own father, perhaps more dangerous than his entire band put together. If that were the case, then not only was Morgan far out of his league, but she might not even need his help against the mounted men approaching from the north. They were both oddly familiar, however, and Morgan had no idea why.

He didn't have time to dwell on that. The unmistakable sound of hooves caught both his attention and that of the couple. Morgan took the time to look them over as he turned to look northward. He didn't see much weaponry on them, though it could easily be concealed and he wasn't entirely sure the woman wasn't her own weapon. He certainly didn't want to anger either of them. In fact, befriending them would probably be a very good idea.

Within minutes, the approaching horses came into view. Morgan would have seen their dust plume first, except that the road was paved and it had rained the day before. He figured the horses would be riding on the softer shoulder anyway, since asphalt was murder on hooves.

Morgan turned back to the couple. “They...” He gestured northward. “...are a threat.” His words were almost halting. He hoped he didn't sound like an idiot. At best, he'd appear to be a foreigner for whom English was a second language.

“Indeed?” said the man pensively.

“We'll see about that,” said the woman. There was an edge in her voice that made Morgan nervous.

Morgan adjusted his grip on his bow as the column approached. The minutes crawled by. Morgan spent that time to collect himself. He re-wove the magic in his armor. He re-applied the enchantments to his arrows. Both required verbalizations, which his mother had taught him to do under his breath. Hopefully his, er, companions would just think he was muttering to himself. He also readied his personal shielding spell. By now, he could easily feel each of the people approaching.

The horsemen wore and carried the standard Rawlinsian kit: boiled leather armor, usually cowhide; mild-steel bowl helms; variously-shaped metal shields made from old road signs; chete-type swords made from ground-down leaf springs; pole-arms; and crossbows.

The soldiers spread out in a semi-circle while their leader, whom Morgan recognized as one James Cyrus, stopped a few yards from Morgan. The man was...well, there were no words in English or Ingarian rude enough to do him justice. “Well, well, well,” he said, “what have we here?”

Morgan wasn't sure how to answer that. Maybe he'd pretend he didn't understand. He raised his bow and drew, ignoring the persistent, dull pain in his arm. He hoped he wouldn't have to use it. Sometimes the best tactic was to make an opponent _think_ you would.

“We're just passing through,” said the man.

“Are you, now?” said Cyrus.

“We are,” said the woman.

“Now, isn't that special?” said Cyrus. He chuckled in a way that made Morgan's hair stand on-end. “No, I think you're coming with us.”

“Now,” said the man casually, “that's where you'd be gravely mistaken.”

Cyrus rolled his eyes. “Seize them,” he commanded.

“I wouldn't try that if I were you,” the woman said coldly.

The Rawlins soldiers, predictably, didn't listen to the girl. They advanced anyway. The pair responded by drawing...frying pans? Well, thought Morgan, blunt-force trauma works, too.

Morgan could feel a man walking up behind him. He raised his magical shield. In an instant, he loosed an arrow. His arrow was enchanted to seek the weakest point in the armor of his nearest attacker. No sooner had it cleared his bow-stave than it abruptly turned one-eighty and flew past Morgan. He heard the distinct _SMACK_ of an arrow hitting something soft directly behind him, followed immediately by a curse. Morgan already had another arrow on the string. He loosed again, and again the arrow turned to hit someone behind him. A third arrow followed the first two. Morgan put a fourth arrow to the string.

He felt a ripple as a crossbow bolt hit his shield and shattered into so much sawdust. A second did likewise. Then all hell broke loose. Morgan saw out of the corner of his eye that the couple were wielding their frying pans, but in a curious way that combined sword and mace styles. A blur of something, probably another bolt, erupted into flame, followed by another fiery blur. A couple more bolts shattered against Morgan's shield.

Then he felt a bolt bounce off his armor. That meant his shield was failing. That was the thing with that type of shield. It was a little unstable. He was ever so glad of the magic woven into his armor. He pushed the shield back up and loosed another arrow, and another, and another. Each arrow left the string, then changed direction, sometimes dramatically, to hit one of his attackers in a seemingly-random place.

Morgan didn't need to look in order to shoot. His arrows would continue to find their own targets and as long as he kept his shield up, none of the enemy bolts could touch him. That would change were one of them to move on him with a blade, but he'd worry about that later. He spared a few moments to glance over at his apparent companions. Both were swinging their frying pans like clubs—very skillfully-controlled clubs. In fact, their defenses were impenetrable. He watched as a couple more bolts burst into flame, disintegrating into ash in moments. He made a mental note to find out who was doing that and how.

Morgan's attention caught the flash of a blade approaching him. Still holding his bow in his left hand, he drew his knife with his right, holding it in an underhand grip. He charged the blade with magic and prepared to meet his opponent's strike. The man's sword swung in a powerful arc directly toward Morgan's head. He lifted his knife to intercept it. His blade caught the enemy's...and sliced neatly through it. The longer edge went cartwheeling off behind him.

Morgan returned to the ready position in time to catch another blade, with the same result, and leaving both enemy soldiers staring at the useless stubs that had once been their weapons. Morgan dodged a third blade and sliced his own through that man's metal shield, which fell cleanly apart as though it were so much cardboard.

He severed another blade, then followed through with a sweeping motion that cut neatly through another man's leg armor and the flesh below. He spun beneath yet another blade and cut through that man's ankle.  
He intercepted and severed yet another blade as he rose, slicing that man's shield vertically and cutting its wielder's arm in half in the process. All the screams were, by now, blending together, and the tang of spilled blood mingled with the gritty taste of limestone dust.

He caught a glimpse of Cyrus looming over him on horseback. Spinning backward, Morgan drove his right lenom up into the horse's chest. Using the recoil to pull his bone back out, he cleared the screaming animal's pawing hooves. A glinting arc of blood droplets streamed through the air.

Morgan whirled around as Cyrus toppled from his horse. The man clambered up as his animal writhed on the ground, pink froth coming from its mouth. Morgan ignored the horse and locked eyes with Cyrus.

By now, the skirmish had ground to a halt. Most of the Rawlins men were either lying on the ground, or holding an arm or leg, and uttering various expressions of pain.

“I told you,” said the woman, who stepped up from Morgan's right and pointed a frying pan at Cyrus, “not to try that.”

A soldier stepped up behind the woman. Before anyone could react, she struck backward with the pan, without looking, and hit her would-be assailant in the face. The man went down.

Morgan noticed that she wasn't even out of breath. He glanced further to the right and saw that her partner wasn't either. Were they that good?

“Now,” she continued, “here's what you're going to do. You and your survivors are going to pick yourselves up. Then you're going to pick up your fallen. After that, you're going to go back home and stop being...” She turned to look back over her shoulder. “What's that expression Sophia uses? I never can remember.”

“Prick,” said the man.

“Thank-you.” She turned back to Cyrus. “You'll stop being a prick.”

“And if I don't?” he said.

“You had twenty-four heavily-armed and armored men against three minimally so. You really think you can take me after this?” She gestured to the carnage around them.

That's interesting, thought Morgan. She said, 'me,' not 'us.' How powerful _is_ she?

“I have an army,” said Cyrus.

“Correction,” said the man, “your _boss_ has an army.”

“Besides,” said the woman, “you and your boss could ally with every other army this side of the Rocky Mountains and I would still win.”

“And just how big is _your_ army?”

“You misunderstand me,” said the woman. “Every army on Earth could gang up on me and I, by myself, could lay you all to waste with plenty of time for afternoon tea.”

“You're bluffing.”

“Don't task me, young man,” said the woman sternly. “You have no idea with whom you are dealing.”

Morgan knew Cyrus was pushing forty, give or take a couple of years. The man was going visibly grey, after all. Yet the woman called him, “young man.”

“Neither do you,” said Cyrus.

“Oh, I'm quite sure I do,” said the woman. “Besides, I believe the results speak for themselves. Now, we can stand here all day posturing back and forth, or you can pick up your sorry behinds and drag them back to that boss of yours.”

It seemed to Morgan that she was incredibly confident, perhaps overly so. Morgan knew how dangerous Cyrus was and hoped the woman wasn't underestimating the man.

Cyrus glared at the woman. At length, he motioned to his men. They quickly went to work picking up their fallen and placing them over horses.

“Oh,” said the woman, “and you won't be needing all of those horses. Especially not the dead ones. And some of your men will be walking.”

“The hell they will,” growled Cyrus.

Several horses suddenly twitched and fell over, lying motionless on the ground.

“Do not argue with me, young man,” said the woman. “I guarantee you will lose.” Morgan had very little doubt about that.

“This isn't over,” growled Cyrus.

“I'm counting on that,” said the woman. She watched as Cyrus and his men trudged off down the road before turning to Morgan.

“That was some fancy fighting,” said the man. “I was watching. Your father would be proud of you.”

Morgan raised an eyebrow.

“Ah, don't worry,” said the man dismissively, “those guys are amateurs. Dangerous amateurs, but amateurs nonetheless. I could have fought them using only my peripheral vision and my wife could have fought them with her eyes closed.”

Morgan's eyebrow rose a bit more.

“I see you've become a barefooter, too,” said the woman, gesturing downward. Morgan looked down at his dusty feet and then at the woman's equally-bare, but delicate and fully human feet. Morgan shrugged.

“Nice lenomi,” said the man, “how'd they get that long? Don't tell me your mother got carried away with your DNA.”

Morgan blinked.

“Oh, don't tell me you don't recognize us,” said the woman.

Morgan's eyebrow continued rising.

“You know, Morgan,” said the woman, “if that eyebrow of yours keeps going up like that, I daresay it may just fly right off your face.”

Morgan's jaw dropped.

“The last time we saw you,” said the man, “you were this high.” He held a frying pan about four feet off the ground, then placed it back into the pan-shaped pouch at his waist. “Your mother's been doing more magic on you, hasn't she?”

The woman tittered a little, then tittered some more.

The man looked at her and rolled his eyes. “Here it comes,” he said as he stepped over to her. She started laughing, softly at first, then louder and longer until she began to lose her footing. The man caught her and lowered her onto the ground where she lay laughing and slowly rolling back and forth. She did that for what Morgan thought might have been a full five minutes before the fit tapered off.

The woman, with the man's help, picked herself up off the ground and dusted herself off. “Oh, I'm terribly sorry about that. It's just that...well, certain kinds of brain activity are highly amusing. You have no idea just how funny it really is...no idea why.” She took in a few deep breaths, held them, and slowly let them back out. “All these years of discipline and that still gets me.”

The man just smiled at her. “And I still think it's adorable,” he said.

“Who...who _are_ you?” said Morgan.

“It's only been six years,” said the woman.

“Though you were five at the time,” said the man.

Suddenly, the memories clicked. “Eugene...and...Rapunzel?”

The couple nodded.

“My parents talk about you...a lot. They also know you are coming.” Morgan had nearly forgotten how exhausting speaking English could be. He didn't have to do it much. Everyone back at camp knew at least enough Ingarian that it wasn't an issue.

“Ai,” yes, said Rapunzel. “Tinmothomir.” They're expecting us. “Ai, thu-Ingarawa sheya modil.” Yes, we speak a little Ingarian.

Morgan smiled broadly.

“Now,” said Rapunzel, looking at the dead horses, “what shall we do with these horse carcases?” She looked at Morgan. “Blood?”

Morgan grinned and Rapunzel mirrored it, but in a way that would have made Morgan nervous had he not shared the same hunger for fresh animal blood.

* * *

The sun was beginning to set as the last of the dead horses magically vanished. The three of them had set aside enough of the meat to feed themselves for a few days.

“You know,” said Rapunzel, “I do believe that was the best meal I've eaten in a while.”

Morgan was astonished, not only at the sheer quantity of food Rapunzel had consumed, but at the speed with which she ate it and that she had not belched once. Morgan didn't know anyone who could do that. He was beginning to understand why the band had been gathering so much food as of late.

“She always says that,” said Eugene. “She always eats like that, too.”

Rapunzel was apparently not bothered by that. In fact, she just smiled. Morgan was quite sure his own mother would have given his father a severe elbow-jab to the ribs for a remark like that.

“We're how far from your home now?” said Eugene.

That was the first time Morgan had heard anyone call his camp “home.” He thought of it like that, of course. After all, he'd lived there longer than he'd lived anywhere else. It was just that hardly anyone else actually called it that, regardless of the fact that his father had magically enhanced everyone's tents to give them the properties of actual houses.

“Seven days,” said Morgan. He was used to measuring distances in terms of the time needed to travel from one place to another. There were just too many variables to do it any other way. “Daln redulgen.” Dawn until dusk.

Eugene nodded. “I don't suppose you have any other magical transportation tricks up your sleeve, do you?”

Morgan shook his head. “Lein. Tomi welan.” No. For me only.

“I see,” said Eugene.

“If we're to complete our journey the conventional way,” said Rapunzel, “then perhaps we can help you with your hunting. After all, we're why you're out here. It's only good manners.”

“Ai,” said Morgan. “Loramin.” Thank-you.

“We should get some sleep,” said Eugene. “It's been...an interesting day.” He quickly pitched a small A-frame tent.

Rapunzel led their animal, which they called a llama, over to the tent and coaxed it into lying down. Morgan was impressed with how easily she controlled it. It wasn't that his band had many pack animals, so he didn't have a lot of experience, but he had made any number of observations of others' beasts. She nodded to the animal.

“Sleep next to her,” said Rapunzel. “She'll help keep you warm.”

Morgan did so as Eugene and Rapunzel disappeared into their tent. He snuggled up against the animal's warm wool, his back to it. Soon he drifted off to sleep.

**Author's Note:**

> WARNING: NEVER eat any wild plant unless you know EXACTLY what it is, which part is edible, and how to prepare it! Some of the plants Morgan uses for his tea in the story are HIGHLY toxic to humans! Death camas in particular is also known to be toxic to cattle. (I wanted to include monkshood in his tea, but according to the Rocky Mountain Herbarium http://www.rmh.uwyo.edu/ it doesn't occur anywhere near the southeastern end of the Wind River Range where the story opens.)


End file.
